Overlap
by Ceasefire
Summary: [HavocHawkeye, chapter 40 spoilers, 2 of 3 parts posted] She had sworn to him that she would always stand by him, and Riza Hawkeye never broke promises.
1. Overlap

Some of these were drabble ideas I wrote ages ago; I tweaked them until they fit here, so what we have is a series of short drabbles that run in chronological order from Chapter 40 to my little AU aftermath. Some things are out of order, but I hope you enjoy this regardless.

Italics represent flashbacks. **There are scenes of mild sexual nature in this fic.** Please do not read if you're sensitive to these things.

* * *

_"My legs… I can't feel them. I'm sorry. I must retire."_

_And suddenly, she found herself wondering if it was possible to feel mutual pain._

It tore Riza to see him like this; lying back against his pillows with his legs propped up to help blood flow. She could literally see his fingers twitching for the cigarette the nurses wouldn't let him have; to combat this, he rubbed his hand through his hair and across his face, accentuating the fine lines that were slowly becoming more and more obvious on a face so young. He had been forced into retirement and he was in the hospital for another night, which was melancholy in itself.

"I'm going home tomorrow."

Jean's voice broke through the silence and Riza's eyes immediately met his. Was it possible for a person to be caught between hopeful determination and utter hopelessness? She wanted to hold him, but this was not the place. So instead, she forced a smile and grasped his hand for the briefest of moments.

"Yes. You're going home."

* * *

Ambulance transportation. Havoc already felt like a corpse. 

"The Retirement Department said they would be around again today with more papers for you to sign, Jean," his mother was hovering behind him anxiously with one had on his shoulder, as if she was afraid he was going to slip right out the bottom of the stretcher and fall down a conveniently placed open manhole.

"… although I'm not quite sure that the doors are wide enough for your wheelchair… Jean, are you listening to me?"

He had to admit that he wasn't, because Hawkeye was standing beside the ambulance with her hands crossed over her chest. When she noticed them approach she moved to stand in front of him, and offered him her hand.

"Lieutenant Hawkeye?" he asked, acutely aware of his mother's bemused gaze.

"Get up, Lieutenant Havoc."

"Miss, in case you didn't notice, my son is now disabled!" Jean was quite torn between thinking Riza was mad and that his mother was treating him like a toddler, but Riza (in a way that was so like her) replied with, "Mrs. Havoc, can I count on your assistance here? Your son needs to get from this stretcher to the ambulance, and he'll have to be supported by the both of us."

His mother looked set to protest again, so Havoc did the thing he thought would shut her up and grabbed Riza's hand, like she had with his the night before. Hawkeye looked momentarily surprised and he smiled at this, happy to have caught her off guard for once. He had no doubt that this would be the only time.

"You'll have to take this step eventually, so you might as well do it now."

It was a hard step to take, but with the help of his mother and the First Lieutenant, he was transferred from the wheeled stretcher to the flat table-like bed in the back of the ambulance. Both his mother and Riza had narrowly managed to squeeze in on either side of him, and he closed his eyes and smiled.

_'Yes, I'll have to be supported by both of them.' _

* * *

The store was easily the biggest part of their house; the rest was so small and filled up with merchandise that he'd eventually moved all of his belongings to the old shed standing out the back of the house, after he'd cleaned out all the old farming equipment left by the former resident. And now that Riza seemed fixed on staying with him, he was glad he'd been rebellious enough to propose the move as a teen. It was relatively bare; his bed, a dresser with some of his old clothes, a simple wooden chair. 

His mother had helped them move all the things they'd bought from the hospital to 'help him adjust to his new lifestyle' and hovered around for a bit, as if daring Riza to mistreat him in the slightest. His father then came to tell his mother that they needed assistance in the shop, and she left very unwillingly.

"Hah, she's afraid you'll brutally bash and rape me and leave me for dead," Havoc laughed as Riza sighed and sat down on the little space left on his pillow, so close that her thigh was brushing lightly against his cheek.

"She's just concerned for you," Riza replied, unconsciously reaching down to place her hand on Havoc's other cheek, gently running the tips of her fingers across his skin; he caught her fingers between his teeth and traced his tongue down the fine line of the bone. It was at this point that she froze, and Havoc craned his neck to meet her eyes.

"I'm concerned for you too," she said that so simply, but her words carried the weight of the world to him, and so he smiled and wrapped his arm around her waist.

"I know."

* * *

She stayed the night, eventually dozing off on his shoulder, still in uniform. The next morning she was gone before he awoke, and his mother explained she'd had to return to Central following a call from Mustang. 

"She's a nice woman, actually," his mother said whilst fluffing his pillows for the seventh time, "Really down to earth and secure, not like the other women you used to bring home, young man..."

Havoc laughed and replied, "You don't have to put it in such an indignant tone, you know."

"Oh, yes I do. The amount of times you brought home girls from the towns around here, and they were usually carrying guns or some other weapon… I'm glad you've settled down a bit, Jean," she asserted, placing the sort of kiss only a mother could give upon his cheek and leaving to return to the store.

Havoc resisted the urge to laugh until he figured she was a fair way away, and then laughed and found himself very glad that his mother was yet to meet Riza Hawkeye the markswoman.

* * *

She retuned late that afternoon, with a suitcase barely filled with clothes and Black Hayate at her heel. 

"Hayate barely managed to escape your mother's fussing," Riza smiled, placed the case neatly in the corner and bent over to unzip it and retrieve the dog's water bowl.

"She does that. Trust me, twenty-four years of life with the woman has taught me that. But she means well."

"I would assume she's already planning the wedding day," Riza said lightly, reaching down to pat Hayate's head, and his tail thumping violently against her leg was the reply. "Do you have any water here?"

"I'm afraid you'll have to go to the house for that, Riza. If my mother harasses you again you have my permission to beat her off with some form of blunt object."

"Somehow, I don't think that'd stop her," Riza replied, and Jean laughed; the way she was familiar with, deep in his throat and husky from the cigarettes he smoked.

"You're probably right," she smiled in return, and opened the wooden door. Hayate immediately jumped to heel but Riza gave him a stern look and he sat down on his haunches as quick as lightning. "Stay here with the Lieutenant, boy. I trust him with you now, but..." she paused and her gaze flickered back towards Jean, "... you just don't know how many other people around here eat dog."

* * *

"I've been trying to put my finger on it all day, and I just realized..." Riza trailed off to place a delicate sliver of potato in her mouth. Jean looked up from dismembering the piece of red meat on his plate (he wasn't quite sure what sort of meat it was, but seeing that the dog had received the same thing he didn't have supreme confidence) and waited until she finished chewing; her jaw worked against the soft texture of the food, she swallowed and let loose a soft breath. 

"I just realized why you've looked so... unlike you lately."

"Oh?" he didn't look up from his dinner (and possibly the toughest piece of meat ever to grace an Amestrian plate in history).

"It's because you haven't smoked once."

"Aah... there's actually a reason behind that," at that point, he tried to skewer the steak, but it slipped from his plate and Black Hayate snatched it gleefully, and retreated under the bed to enjoy his prize. Jean looked bemused and Riza sighed (in a way that reminded him of the office; her 'I'm surrounded by idiots' sigh, Breda called it) and replaced his now empty plate with hers, which still contained half of the mystery meat and the potato she hadn't finished.

"I should have known better than to think that you'd gone through a miraculous health reform."

"We've all got to go sometime; might as well enjoy what we have," Havoc shrugged and Hawkeye revelled in the irony, considering what he'd been like at the hospital. "But the honest truth is that my parents don't know that I smoke."

"That's good," she replied, her tone flat, "You'll be needing to watch your health from now on."

Not another word was spoken after that, and Riza watched Jean finish what had remained of her food in silence.

* * *

Like a sudden flashback to younger years, both Hawkeye and Havoc realized that this was as good a time as any to experiment. 

"What do you mean 'I didn't ask them'?" Riza questioned; she was perched on Jean's upper thighs, legs straddled either side of him and lips pressed into the soft flesh just under his earlobe.

"What was I supposed to ask?_ 'Hello there, Miss Cute Redhead Nurse; just wondering whether everything ' I down there will still work. Aww, c'mon, you know what I mean..._'"

"Very funny, Casanova."

"Aww, but you think I'm sexy."

"Don't flatter yourself," Riza hissed, and pulled him into a searing kiss. Her tongue dipped across his lips and she squirmed deliciously in his lap.

Jean couldn't feel the change, the stirring, but Riza could. She broke away and smiled that slow, warm smile he had become accustomed to seeing on her face at these times.

"Well, now that_ that_ question has been taken care of, shall we?"

Havoc wasted no time and reached to work on Hawkeye's crisply-buttoned white shirt.

* * *

_"Looking at me like that in this place is dangerous."_

_"I know."_

_"Then why do you do it?"_

_"Oh, I'm not quite sure..." his breath was hot against her bare shoulder and his arms were tight and protective around her torso._

_"The next time you tell me to come to the dorms to give you 'medical assistance', remind me to ignore you."_

_"Well, the next time I tell you to take the day off work with me, you should listen."_

_She sighed and leaned down to kiss the gentle curve at his elbow, and he grinned and pressed his lips against her hair. Riza Hawkeye stands steady on a score in the millions, and Jean Havoc finally gets off the mark._

* * *

"You know..." she whispered, hips keeping the rhythmas she spoke, "It'd be interesting if your mother walked in on us like this." 

"Bloody Hell," he murmured, leaning down to place a kiss on her lips, "Anyone would think you were _trying_ to make me impotent."

"No such luck."

"Very funny."

Riza opened her mouth to respond, but Havoc's mouth found the milky rise of her breast and nipped, and she found herself rendered delightfully speechless.

"I think I just scored again," his voice was growing hoarse just like it always did when he was close to the edge, even though he could no longer feel the sensation quite as well as he wanted. She wanted him to know that she could feel for both of them, and she left kissesacross his neck and shoulders, matching this swiftness.

"I'm still winning." A sharp breath and snap of the hips as he reached between them and brushedher skinwith a rough fingertip.

He comes, and his brain registered the sensation but he couldn't feel the warmth of her around him, couldn't jerk his hips to meet her andas her mouth formed that perfect 'O' she fell against him, hair tangled wildly over his chest. He satisfied himself with pressing his face into her neck and holding her tight, and suddenly she felt wonderfully secure.

"Please don't ever leave," he whispered, lips still pressed against the sweet dip in her throat.

"I won't."

* * *

The next day was the first time he'd ventured into the outside since his accident. Riza had insisted upon it, and had received the assistance of his father in lugging Jean into his wheelchair, despite how much the man in question looked pouty. 

If Jean's mother was the most talkative person she'd ever met, his father was certainly the most silent, but reminded her of her lover in a way that was far beyond any similarities he had with his mother.

When he'd said his hometown was small, he'd made a gross overstatement in the fact that the town actually had a population just topping one hundred; his family's store was the third-biggest building in town after the hospital and the bank.

Eventually, she found what was apparently the town's idea of a park; a piece of grass three meters square with a bench planted perfectly in the middle. She pushed his chair next to the bench, but reconsidered and sat comfortably on his lap, leaning her head back to rest against his shoulder. He rested his cheek against hers and she never objected to the raw stubble that was now growing where his skin was once smooth.

"I meant what I said last night, you know."

"I know."

Riza started to absently play with his hair and Jean laughed and pressed a soft kiss against her cheek.

This was Riza Hawkeye, who was willing to teach him to live again.

**_Love, like a river, will cut a new path whenever it meets an obstacle._**

**-- Unknown**

**END

* * *

Notes:**

Not bad for a first try, if I do say so myself. I've got to write more for this couple. Any comments? 


	2. Here's To Our Future

Second part of this little series; I don't own FMA, kiddies.

I had to use the words and or things thunderstorm, kiss and library in this fic. Yeah, it was one of those pairing generator challenges. It's set after Part One, as Roy is ready to make his move on Bradley. **This is future AU.**

* * *

Forty-one minutes and twenty seconds until the hour. Forty-one minutes and seventeen seconds until Colonel Roy Mustang made his long-anticipated move on Central with just Hawkeye, Breda, Farman, Fuery and Armstrong as his backup. Forty-one minutes and eleven seconds until his closest friends left for a cause that may well have been hopeless. Lightning flashed outside, illuminating the small library that Northern HQ kept through large, multi-storey windows; the shock of the sudden stormy weather was just enough to bring Jean from his thoughts and back to the papers he was supposed to be looking over. They were records dating back many years, and he was supposed to be looking for any mention of Fuhrer King Bradley, but had found no hide nor hair of the Fuhrer mentioned so far. Perhaps what had annoyed him the most about this little exercise is that Mustang had chosen not to divulge to them the reason for his wanting to know minor details about Bradley's military history. First Lieutenant Riza Hawkeye had asked no questions as opposed to the barrage that Havoc himself had immediately fired off, but simply nodded, saluted and began to move both his wheelchair and himself towards the library, her hold on the rubber grips of the wheelchair tightening so quickly that her fingernail squeaked against the smooth texture of the rubber. Riza had always been so much better than the rest of them at deciphering Roy language.

Hawkeye was currently seated opposite him, her reading glasses perched on the end of her small, pointed nose and her hair hanging loose down her back to complement her plain civilian attire. She was reading over the handwritten records and notes quietly, and appeared impassive to the heavy sheets of rain that were now hammering against the glass panes of the windows. He, however, felt nervous and restless; he had never been an academic in his own humble opinion and the current situation was doing nothing to help his inability to focus on the frustratingly loopy, aged scrawl on the yellowed paper in front of him. Ever since they'd invited him to come North with them since his hometown was left empty by yet another military conflict and his parents decided to move their store to the South, he'd felt they had been carefully treading on eggshells around him, so as not to alarm him with what they'd discovered; Mustang and Hawkeye were especially bad, but he suspected she was just picking up on Mustang's feelings as she so often did and was reacting accordingly.

Another lightning strike tore both of them from their thoughts this time, and Havoc immediately glanced at the clock; twenty-nine minutes, thirty-three seconds. He turned back to Riza and their eyes met; hers were almost bright red in the light of the lightning, and the stiff-jawed formality on her face was unnerving him.

"Riza."

"Yes, Second Lieutenant?"

_"Riza."_

"What is it, Jean?" she asked plainly, returning to her notes as if the former exchange had never occurred.

"What aren't you telling me?"

"There's nothing that you don't already know."

"Don't give me that crap," he hissed, "You're hiding something from me."

"And why would I ever feel the need to hide anything from you?" she questioned, the barest hint of frustration in her voice.

Jean fell silent and Riza's eyes flickered upwards to look at him.

"Do you think that we... that I somehow don't think you're worthy of being in on the Colonel's plans?"

"What else am I supposed to think!" he snarled, and he immediately regretted acting so selfishly as he saw Riza's eyes darken to their usual shade of claret in flash of the lightning; she got to her feet and thunder rumbled in the distance, as if mirroring her anguish.

"Do you think that we… that I ever wanted to see you like this? Do you not think that Roy felt guilt after that homunculus attacked you? Do you think that I... heck, _any_ of us have any less respect for you now than we did before you were in this wheelchair? Do you think that the Colonel wants to be going into a make-or-break situation without one of his most trusted subordinates at his back?" she retorted, voice low in her throat and hands fisted at her sides, "Do you think for one second that I would hide from you what I knew if Mustang would just... oh, God, Jean!"

Hawkeye crossed her arms just below her breasts and looked away from him, trying to steady her breathing; she eventually decided that this apparently was not enough and raised her right hand, carefully bit down on the side of her index finger and said nothing.

Havoc chewed uncomfortably on his bottom lip, trying to decide the best course of action. After two minutes of careful procrastination, he laced his fingers through the spokes of the wheels on his chair and gradually made his way over to her with the brakes still on; he couldn't reach them himself and he didn't want to ask her, so instead he made his slow, shuddering journey across the carpeted floor and finally took her hand when he reached her; she was apparently too intent on staring out at the storm to notice this, because when his fingers laced through hers she jumped.

"I'm sorry... I didn't think of what this meant for you, and I..." he paused, searching for the right words, "I'm afraid that all of you are going to go out there and never come back, that I'll never see you again. I don't think I could take it."

She sighed and squeezed his fingers, and he drew her down and into his lap with a gentle tug on her arm. Riza perched herself horizontally across his lap, legs hanging over the armrest of his wheelchair and head rested comfortably into the curve of his neck. A part of himself reflected that they hadn't sat together like this since the week he'd arrived back in his hometown; it had been almost a year since then.

"I don't want to lose you Riza."

"I made a promise to you; a promise that I'd never leave you," she whispered, her breath soft and sweet against his skin, "And have you ever known me to break a promise to someone I love?"

He shook his head slowly and slid his arm carefully around her waist.

"Then you have to understand that I might be gone for a while, but I'll always return to you as soon as I can."

"I know that," he whispered hoarsely.

"Then you must know that you're not the only one I have a promise to... he misses you too Jean, but he understands that for the moment, you can't follow him but eventually you'll have to catch up. Now, the question is if _you_ understand that?"

Jean nodded and slipped his hand up to the back of her neck.

"I do. Now kiss me before I say anything else unbearably stupid."

She smiled and pressed her lips softly against his skin; first his earlobe, then his cheek, and finally in the soft space just between mouth and chin. He drew his tongue along her bottom lip and leaned in further as those lips parted to let him kiss her. She squirmed in his lap and threaded her left hand through the back of his hair, brought her tongue up to meet his as he ran his hands down her back and slipped his fingers under her shirt to feel the soft dips and rises in her vertebrae. When they broke away from one another, her head rested on his shoulder and his arm was once again around her waist, with his fingers brushing gently against her thigh through the material of her skirt.

"Hey, I was thinking just before..." he breathed, but he was quickly cut off.

"You mean when you were supposed to be working?"

"Yeah, then," he smiled, and he could almost see that amused little smirk appearing on her face, "I was thinking... seeing that my hometown has pretty much gone to heck in a hand basket... after the Chief's had his revolution and become Fuhrer, how about we buy a place in Central somewhere?"

"Firstly, that is _if_he succeeds and secondly, are you inviting me to live with you?" she smiled, poking him in painfully in the chest just below his sternum.

'"It's not 'if', it's 'when'. And technically, you've been living with me for almost a year."

"Hayate goes where I go."

"I have a feeling we're going to have to prise my mother off him with a crowbar when we go to pick him up."

Riza was silent, obviously considering her options. She nodded slowly, and murmured, "I'll give you my answer when I return from this... this mission."

"What if you don't return from this mission?" he shivered, dreading the very prospect that even one of them would not make it out alive.

"It's not 'if', it's 'when'," she teased, and her eyes moved to the clock on the wall. Ten minutes until the allotted meeting time. "I have to go and get ready now."

Havoc nodded and slowly released her small frame from his embrace; she stood slowly, and leaned down to kiss the side of his neck before making her way back to the table.

"Did you find anything on Bradley?"

"Nothing. You?"

"No, but I'm sure Roy just gave all of us jobs in order to give us all time to ourselves beforehand."

Damn and bless that woman and her perception. "Why did he..." he was silenced with a dry look. "So he knows?"

"Let's just say he notices changes in people, especially his subordinates."

She kicked the breaks on his wheelchair and walked towards the door slowly, opening it for him before stepping out herself. This is where they were forced to head in opposite directions.

"I'll see you at the top, Lieutenant," he saluted, fingertips trembling just enough to betray him.

"I'll see you again soon," she said, and her words sounded weighted. And with that, the two of them turned their separate ways with backs to one another.

It was the first time Riza hadn't been there to help him get into bed, so he called for assistance from two of the guards in the dorms. Once he was settled in with everything he'd need for the night, the two nervous young officers left. Havoc was proud that he managed to hold himself with pride and calm until they left the room.

Riza Hawkeye had never broken a promise. For now, all he could do was hold belief in her, and in Mustang's ideals. Then, he would see what tomorrow would bring for all of Amestris.

**END**

* * *

Third part of this is currently being mapped out; it'll bea while before it's done. I hope you enjoyed this little interlude, however. 


End file.
